Search This Blog

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

I
hope that all of you have a wonderful Halloween night, and that you
have lots of tricks and treats headed your way. I imagine that quite
a few of you will be headed out for candy collecting this evening,
and I hope that your pillowcases, reusable grocery bags, and plastic
pumpkin buckets get filled to capacity this year.

But
before I go on with today's special Halloween topic, I just want to
remind you all to play it safe this Halloween. Halloween can be a
day that is filled with lots of fun and haunting good times. But it
can also be a day that can be dangerous if you don't take the proper
precautions. Here is a mandatory list of things that you can do to
make this Halloween a safe one.

If
you're going trick-or-treating, wear bright colours so that drivers
can see you. If your costume does not have any bright colours, wear
reflective tape or carry a glo-stick so that you can be seen.

Always
make sure that you are with at least one other person when you go
trick-or-treating. There is safety in numbers!

When
you get home, have your parents or guardians check over your stash
of candy for unwrapped or peculiar looking candies. Although most
homes are safe to accept treats from, you can never be too careful.

A
good rule of thumb is to toss out any homemade treats that are given
out, unless they happen to come from someone that you know and
trust, like a neighbour or family member.

If
you are 21 or over (19 in Canada), make sure you have a designated
driver if you drink a little bit too much. Barring all that, make
plans to stay overnight. A Halloween DUI is no fun.

But,
most of all, HAVE FUN! Halloween is supposed to be a fun holiday,
and it only comes around once a year, so make the best of it!

Now
for today's special Halloween themed blog entry, I thought that I
would choose something that has been the focal point of many
Halloween parties. Most times, they are used in harmless fun...but
there have been a few instances in which they have awakened the dead,
and caused spiritual unrest. Sometimes they can even be cursed, or
deadly, depending on the movie in which you see them in.

Hard
to believe that a piece of wood could have so much power.

Yes,
today's topic is all about the Ouija Board...a fitting end to the
month of spookiness known as October.

By
all accounts, the Ouija (pronouced Wee-Jee)...

...ahem...thank
you, Luigi.

As
I was saying, the Ouija Board upon first glance doesn't look all that
frightening. It's a piece of wood with all the letters in the
alphabet, the numerals 0-9, and a few words that include “Yes”,
“No”, “Hello” (sometimes), and “Goodbye”. If anything,
it might look like something that could be sold at Mr. Hooper's Store
on Sesame Street.

The
trick with the Ouija Board comes from the second piece of the game.
Each Ouija Board comes with a small, triangular piece known as a
planchette, and how it works is that the person who is calling the
séance uses the planchette to communicate messages from the dead to
the living, and everyone else involved in the séance is supposed to
hold the planchette as well. For instance, if a spirit wants to
indicate that they are present, the planchette will mysteriously move
to the word “Hello”. Or, sometimes the spirit might wish to
spell out a person's name, so the planchette will move to each letter
in the person's name. It'd take a short time if your name was Lee,
but forever if your name happened to be Elizabeth-Maria or something
similar.

Would
you believe that the Ouija Board has been sold in stores for well
over one hundred years? The idea behind the Ouija Board was first
pitched by businessmen Elijah Bond and Charles Kennard. They had the
idea of patenting a planchette sold with a board with the alphabet
written on it, because at the time, planchettes were considered to be
a novelty toy.

Bond
and Kennard filed the patent on May 28, 1890, and from there invented
the very first Ouija Board. The issue date on the patent was
February 10, 1891, receiving the U.S. Patent number of 446,054.
William Fuld, an employee of Kennard, took over the talking board
production, and by 1901, he started production of his own boards,
using the name “Ouija”, a word that he claimed was an ancient
Egyptian word meaning “good luck”. But the word “Ouija” is
also a combination of both the French and German translations of the
word “yes”.

At
some point, despite the fact that the board was patented by Bond and
Kennard, Fuld would end up getting notoreity for the board by
rewriting history, claiming that he himself had invented it! Several
companies tried to come up with their own versions of the board using
the “Ouija” name, and Fuld launched lawsuits against all of them
right up to his death in the late 1920s! Fuld's estate sold the
rights to the Ouija board to Parker Brothers in 1966, which was then
transferred to Hasbro when the company bought out Parker Brothers in
1991.

As
far as whether I believe that Ouija Boards can be used to communicate
with the spirit world, I cannot confirm or deny that they do or
don't. I have never owned a Ouija Board, nor have I ever used one.
I imagine that those of you who have might have used a Ouija Board
must have some interesting stories to tell (and if you have a few
minutes, please post them here if you like. I'm sure that some of us
would love to read them!

But
you know something? The Ouija Board wasn't originally meant to be a
communication aid with departed spirits. It wasn't until American
Spiritualist Pearl Curran popularized the board as a use as a
divining tool during the first World War that the meaning changed.

And,
not everyone is pleased over the fact that Ouija Boards exist. There
has been criticism from people of various religions, particularly
from evangelical Christians. In 2001, a demonstration was held in
Alamogordo, New Mexico which saw Ouija Boards and Harry Potter books
burned in a gigantic bonfire by several fundamentalist groups,
claiming that they were “symbols of witchcraft”. Some people
have even claimed that the Ouija Board is actually a tool of Satan!

Other
people claim that the Ouija Board cannot contact spirits, and is
simply just another way for people to part with their money.

But,
I happen to like the mystery behind the Ouija Board. I really think
that the Ouija Board is what you make of it, and if you want to
believe that it works, then work it shall. Or something like that.

To
conclude this Halloween piece, why not take a look at some of the
movies that have used Ouija Boards as part of the plot?

Okay,
okay...so my poetry skills aren't exactly the most stellar. But I
really wanted to make sure that I opened this latest blog entry on a
spooky note, being that tomorrow is Halloween.

And
for today's special entry, we're going to take a look back on an
event that frightened so many people, they expected the absolute
worst.

For
now, let's see what else happened on October 30. I imagine that at
the end of this list come next year, there will be an entry for this
year depicting the “Frankenstorm” of 2012. Again, I imagine that
quite a few of you in the Northeastern USA are likely without power
right now, but if you are able to see this, know that my thoughts are
definitely with you during this time, and I hope that every single
one of you stays safe.

Okay,
so here is what else has happened on the second last day of October.

758
– Guangzhou is sacked by Arab and Persian pirates

1485
– King Henry VII of England is crowned

1831
– Escaped slave Nat Turner is captured and arrested in Virginia
after leading the bloodiest slave rebellion in American history

1864
– The community of Helena, Montana is founded following the
discovery of gold in “Last Chance Gulch” by four prospectors

1894
– Domenico Melegatti obtains a patent for a procedure to be applied
in producing pandoro industrially

Because
today's tale features a very scary story read aloud by a man who
would soon become a Hollywood heavyweight. Although this story was a
fictional account, many who only heard parts of the broadcast
reportedly panicked, thinking that the world as they knew it would
change forever.

Have
any of you heard of an author by the name of H.G. Wells? He was born
in Bromley, Kent, England in 1866 and died on August 13, 1946 at the
age of 79. During his life, he wrote several books which were very
well-received and are widely considered to be classics today. Some
of these books included “The Time Machine”, “The Invisible
Man”, “The Island of Doctor Moreau”, and “The Shape of Things
to Come”.

And
he also wrote the novel entitled “The War of the Worlds”, which
was first printed in the year 1898.

“The
War of the Worlds” was a depiction of what happened when Martians
invaded Earth, and is widely considered to be one of the earliest
literary works that depicted a conflict between mankind and
extraterrestrial beings. Although the initial genre of the book is
classified as being “scientific romance”, people have studied the
novel closely and have interpreted it in a variety of ways since.
Some people saw it as a social commentary piece on evolutionary
theory, while others saw it as a statement regarding British
imperialism. Some simply see the piece as a collection of
Victorian-era superstitions, fears, and prejudices.

At
any rate, the novel has been adapted into several different formats.
Comic books, a television series, and a 2005 movie starring Tom
Cruise and Dakota Fanning.

And
it was also the subject of a particular radio broadcast that aired on
Sunday, October 30, 1938.

In
1938, radio programming was still the number one form of
entertainment for people living in North America. Whether they were
listening to murder mysteries, the world news, or episodes of the
brand new serial “The Guiding Light”, people would sit and listen
to the radio for hours as they went about their household chores.

One
of the most popular radio shows that aired in 1938 was “The Chase
and Sanborn Hour”. It aired every Sunday night at eight o'clock
and starred famous ventriloquist Edgar Bergen (father of Candice) and
his dummy, Charlie McCarthy.

Unfortunately
for the producers of rival radio program “Mercury Theatre on the
Air”, which aired opposite “The Chase and Sanborn Hour”, their
program was walloped in the ratings. And this frustrated the
22-year-old dramatist who headed each edition of the “Mercury
Theatre on the Air”.

In
1938, Orson Welles was more than determined to dethrone Edgar Bergen
as the star of Sunday night radio, and brainstormed various ways to
make his show stand out from the rest.

With
Halloween night the day after the scheduled airing of his show,
Welles debated on how he could make his show extra special for that
day. He then had the idea to take H.G. Wells' “War of the Worlds”
and adapt it into a theatrical play for radio audiences. It was a
big gamble for Welles to take. It was a delicate practice to perform
a play on the radio as in a lot of cases, they did not translate very
well to the audience. After all, radio plays could only be heard and
not seen, and in a lot of cases, the plays were subject to time
constraints (at most, radio shows ran for an hour in length,
including commercial breaks.

So,
Orson Welles had a lot of work to do in order to make his October 30
deadline. He worked with one of the writers of the program, Howard
Koch, rewrote the entire story of “The War of the Worlds”, with
Welles doing quite a few revisions to the script in order to meet the
show length. The setting was also changed from Victorian England to
present day New England.

So,
on October 30, 1938 at 8:00 pm, the “Mercury Theatre on the Air”
kicked off its Halloween broadcast with the following announcement.
“The Columbia Broadcasting System and its affiliated stations
present Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre on the Air in The
War of the Worlds
by H.G. Wells. From there, Orson Welles went on the air and
introduced the play with an introductory paragraph explaining that
the world had been watched by intelligences greater than man's.

After
the intro, the show segwayed into a weather report and music before
being interrupted by a special news bulletin which announced that a
Chicago-based professor had begun seeing explosions taking place on
Mars. The music returned briefly before another news report came on
featuring another interview with another professor. During the
interview, the professor was handed a note explaining that a huge
shock of almost earthquake intensity occurred near Princeton, New
Jersey. It is believed by the professor that the vibration was
caused by a meteorite hitting the earth's surface.

And
at 8:50 that night, yet another news bulletin is broadcast...this
time alerting that another meteorite had struck the planet near
Grovers Mill, New Jersey. “Carl Phillips” soon begins reporting
live from the scene where he discovers that the meteorite is really a
thirty-yard wide metal cylinder, and upon further examination makes
the following report.

Ladies
and gentlemen, this is the most terrifying thing I have ever
witnessed. . . . Wait a minute! Someone's crawling. Someone or . . .
something. I can see peering out of that black hole two luminous
disks . . . are they eyes? It might be a face. It might be . . . good
heavens, something's wriggling out of the shadow like a gray snake.
Now it's another one, and another one, and another one. They look
like tentacles to me. There, I can see the thing's body. It's large
as a bear and it glistens like wet leather. But that face, it . . .
ladies and gentlemen, it's indescribable. I can hardly force myself
to keep looking at it, it's so awful. The eyes are black and gleam
like a serpent. The mouth is kind of V-shaped with saliva dripping
from its rimless lips that seem to quiver and pulsate. A humped
shape is rising out of the pit. I can make out a small beam of light
against a mirror. What's that? There's a jet of flame springing from
the mirror, and it leaps right at the advancing men. It strikes them
head on! Good Lord, they're turning into flame!

The
broadcast then goes silent for a few minutes before resuming with
this frightening revelation, courtesy of an announcer.

Ladies
and gentlemen, I have just been handed a message that came in from
Grovers Mill by telephone. Just one moment please. At least forty
people, including six state troopers, lie dead in a field east of the
village of Grovers Mill, their bodies burned and distorted beyond all
possible recognition.

A
pretty morbid end to the whole night, wouldn't you think? And it
gets worse. By the end of the broadcast, thousands of people are
given the news that the Martians have invaded the earth, and that New
York City was already being evacuated.

Now,
as you all know by now, aliens did not invade the planet seventy-four
years ago. But because many people relied on the radio to report on
the outside world, people took the broadcast seriously (especially if
they were tuning into the show already in progress), and were
actually worried that the aliens were going to take over the world.

Reportedly,
millions of people all over the United States reacted to the news in
a variety of ways. Thousands of listeners called radio stations all
over the country to get more information, and many people allegedly
packed up suitcases prepared to flee their homes if necessary. Now,
the claims of this actually happening have been questioned, and some
don't actually believe that it really happened. But take a look at
this headline from the New York Times dated Monday, October 31, 1938,
and make your own call.

Whatever
the case, the incident was reported as a hoax just hours later, and
many people were very angry at Orson Welles. Many even speculated
that Welles had plotted the whole radio broadcast as a publicity
stunt. Whatever the case, that one radio broadcast was the beginning
of a lucrative career for Orson Welles, which lasted until his death
in October 1985.

And
to think that it all began the day before Halloween in 1938.

Happy
October 30th, everyone, and for those of you who are
surviving Sandy, we're all pulling for you.

Monday, October 29, 2012

Before I continue with this week’s Monday Matinee,
I just wanted to extend my concerns to those of you living in the Northeastern
part of the United States.As I type
this out, Hurricane Sandy is likely making landfall.I hope that those of you who are in Sandy’s
direct path stay safe, and I hope that everything will be okay for all of
you.Stay indoors if you haven’t
evacuated yet.

For now though, I wish to tell you a personal
story in relation to this edition of the Monday Matinee...a story that dates
back a dozen years.

The year 2000 was a memorable one for me.The last of my nieces and nephews were born
during that year, I was living in Ottawa, Ontario at the time, and I was
nineteen years old.It was also the year
that I managed to discover something about myself.It was the year that I left high school and
ventured out into the world, and realized that people in the real world weren’t
nearly as sheltered, spoiled, and condescending as some of my high school
classmates.They were kind, nice, real
down-to-earth people.I loved every
minute of it.

And imagine my surprise when my social life
improved so much that I ended up going out regularly with groups of friends.

One outing I’ll always remember took place right
around Halloween that year.I was asked
by someone who lived on my residence floor if I wanted to go to a movie with
three of his friends at the Rideau Centre movie theatre.Since I had no other plans that day, I was more
than thrilled to attend.So after we
arrived at the Rideau Centre, popped into Shoppers Drug Mart to stock up on
Sour Patch Kids, Doritos, and Hershey’s Miniatures (which we then proceeded to
smuggle into the handbags and purses of our female companions to avoid the
overpriced concession stands at the theatre), we tried to make up our minds
over what movie we should see.

The decision we eventually came to was to watch a
movie that was a re-release of a classic film.At the time, the film was 27 years old, but we didn’t care.If memory serves me, one of the group had
seen the film already, but I and the three others had not.The reason for the film’s re-release was to
incorporate bonus footage that had been left on the cutting room floor two and
a half decades earlier, but as someone who had never seen the film in its
entirety prior to 2000 it was all new to me.

The film was a classic horror film.Some would even say it was one of the best
horror films ever made.It seems hard to
believe that next year the film will be celebrating its fortieth
anniversary!

I bet that must make Linda Blair feel very old,
huh?

You see, when this film was released, Linda Blair
was just fourteen.Now she’s a woman of
fifty-three!It is really scary how time
flies.

Of course, Linda Blair didn’t exactly have the
most glamourous role in the film.Just
have a look at one of her many scenes in this film.

Lovely, ain’t she?Oh, don’t worry.That “vomit” is
really harmless pea soup.And that’s
just one of the many secrets that I will reveal as we take an in depth look at
William Peter Blatty’s “The Exorcist”, a film adaptation based on Blatty’s book
directed by William Friedkin.

For those of you who have not yet seen the movie
or read the book, I won’t spoil the plot for you too much.But just to give you an indication of what
the basic storyline is, it’s all about a twelve-year-old girl named Regan MacNeil
(Blair) who begins to exhibit dangerous and dramatic mood swings.Her mother Chris (Ellen Burstyn), an actress
who is shooting a film near Washington DC, is quite concerned, and she sends
her daughter for a slew of medical tests which only serve to prove that nothing
is physically wrong with her.She is
then sent to a psychiatrist, whom Regan assaults.By the first half of the film, Chris is at
her wits end, witnessing Regan’s bed violently shaking, hearing strange noises,
and undergoing physical abuse by her daughter.

It gets so extreme that Chris is soon lead to
believe that Regan may be possessed by the devil, and an exorcism must be
performed in order to save Regan’s soul.As a result, psychiatrist/priest Father Damien Karras (Jason Miller) is
asked by Chris to help perform the exorcism, and Karras brings an experienced
exorcist, Father Lankester Merrin (Max von Sydow) to perform the ritual while
Karras assists.But the devil’s spirit
within Regan is not prepared to give up without a fight...and before the night
is out, tragedy will occur.

But of course, that is all that I will tell
you.Believe me when I say that this is
one movie that you will not want to watch with the lights turned off.I admit having to shield my eyes at some of
the scary parts.In fact, I even wrote a
movie review of “The Exorcist” for my school newspaper twelve years ago.I must warn you though, my writing style at
nineteen was a lot more...shall we say...green as pea soup than it is at
thirty-one, so be gentle.J

Now here’s where the fun part comes in.I mentioned a few of the cast members of this
movie as well as the characters that they played in the film.But did you know that almost every character
was designed for other actors to play, and that each actor had their own reason
for turning down the film?

Let’s start with the title role of Regan, shall
we?

One of the actresses who was up for consideration
was Pamelyn Ferdin, who once voiced the character of Lucy Van Pelt and who
starred in a series of supernatural thrillers, but producers nixed the idea
feeling that she was too well-known.Denise Nickerson (who played Violet Beauregard in Willy Wonka & The
Chocolate Factory) was also up for the role of Regan, but her parents made the
decision that the subject matter was too controversial for her, and pulled her
out.Anissa Jones of Family Affair was
also considered.

The role of Father Merrin which eventually went to
Max von Sydow was meant for Marlon Brando to take on if the studio heads had
their way.However, William Friedkin
vetoed the idea because he didn’t want the movie to become a “Brando film”.Meanwhile, regarding the role of Karras, Jack
Nicholson was briefly considered before Stacy Keach initially landed the
role.But when Friedkin spotted Jason
Miller acting in a play, Keach’s contract was bought out and Miller was given
the role instead.

The role of Chris McNeil was also difficult to
cast.Both Shirley MacLaine and Jane
Fonda flat out refused to do the film.Anne Bancroft showed some interest in the role, but as she was pregnant
at the time she was asked, she couldn’t commit to the role.And the only way Audrey Hepburn would do the
role was if the movie could be filmed in Rome.So, after those four women turned down the role, Ellen Burstyn was next
in line to be cast.

Here’s some other trivia for you.

-Mercedes McCambridge provided the
voice of the possessed Regan.

-Although it is a horror movie closely
associated with Halloween, the film was actually released the day after
Christmas, 1973!

-The movie won two of the ten Academy
Awards it was nominated for.

-Ellen Burstyn permanently damaged her
spine while filming this movie.In the
scene where she is thrown away from Regan, she ended up falling on her coccyx,
which caused her to screech in pain.

-Four air conditioners were used in the
refrigerated bedroom scene.

-William Peter Blatty actually used the
winnings he won on the quiz show, “You Bet Your Life” to work on the novel that
inspired the film!

-A moviegoer actually tried suing
Warner Brothers in 1974 after he sustained a broken jaw after fainting during
the film screening!

-If the film was adjusted for
inflation, “The Exorcist” would be the highest grossing horror film of all
time.

-The film schedule was supposed to last
three months.In actuality, it took 224
days!

-Although the late Dana Plato claimed
to have auditioned for the role of Regan, Blatty did not recall seeing her at
any of the auduitions.

-The production process of “The
Exorcist” was done at 666 Fifth Avenue in New York City.Make of that what you will.

-Linda Blair delivered her foul-mouthed
dialogue in such a way that it caused Max von Sydow to temporarily forget his
lines in shock!

-The plot for “The Exorcist” was based
on the alleged real exorcism of a 13-year-old boy named Robbie.

-Although you wouldn’t know it from the
make-up he wore in the film to look older, Max von Sydow was only 44 when he
appeared in the film.

-Director William Friedkin went to
great lengths to get the emotional reactions he wanted in his film, even going
so far as shooting loaded guns near the actors and unexpectedly slapping them
across the face just before shooting pivotal scenes!

-A woman named Linda Tuero was hired as
an extra in the film.She later became
Mrs. William Peter Blatty!

-Linda Blair had bodyguards protecting
her six months after the film was released, due to death threats she received
from religious zealots.

Sunday, October 28, 2012

Have you ever grooved out to a song, loving it for
its funky beat, its happy-go-lucky sound, and its ability to make you showcase
everything you have on the dance floor only to find that if you listen closely
to the lyrics, it’s really a song that has disturbing, horrifying, and even
vulgar undertones to it?

This is the story of one of these songs.

Of course, before I get to the main focus of the
song, I thought that I would share with you some examples of what it is that I
mean in my opening statement.

You know how a song might be fun to dance to, but
once you listen to the lyrics, the song becomes less fun.A popular dance song might lose its lustre
when you discover that the lyrics involve somebody dying from a drug
overdose.A swinging country song might
not seem so happy-go-lucky when you discover that the song is about a child
getting abducted from his house.A rap
song that you think is off the hook might be off the playlists of radio
stations everywhere when it is discovered that the lyrics promote bestiality.

(Not that any of these songs actually exist, mind
you...they’re just extreme examples that I came up with as a supplement to this
blog entry.)

Well, today’s blog is all about a song that was
first performed in 1974, and officially released as a single three years
later.Although the song didn’t do very
well on the Billboard Charts (it barely made it onto the Billboard Hot 100 in
late 1977), it is widely considered to be the single that was deemed the
breakout hit of the band that performed it.Many people would argue that this particular single is the band’s
signature hit (although I also believe songs such as “Once in a Lifetime”, “Burning
Down The House” and “And She Was” rank high up there as well), and I imagine
that hundreds of people rocked out to the beat of the song at proms, dance
clubs, and parties.Allmusic actually
referred to the song as a “deceptively funky New Wave/No Wave song that had an
insistent rhythm, and one of the most memorable, driving basslines in rock and
roll”.

You know something, with a description like that,
I think that we should take a listen to this song right now.

Now you might be surprised by the title of the
song.The song title of “Psycho Killer”
doesn’t exactly sound like one that brings forth memories of happily dancing
with your best friends on a club floor.And if one were to actually sit down and read the lyrics (including the
ones written in French), they may find that the song is all about what the
title describes.

In fact, the song actually started off as a
semi-narrative of a serial killer stalking people and killing them.Talking Heads frontman David Byrne while he
was writing the song stated that he imagined Alice Cooper doing a Randy Newman-type
ballad, and that he always found villains like Hannibal Lecter and the Joker
more fascinating than the heroes.

As I mentioned before, the song was originally
composed in the early 1970s, and was performed by Byrne, and two friends of his
that he met at the Rhode Island School of Design, Chris Frantz and Tina
Weymouth.Only back in those days, they
didn’t go by the name “Talking Heads”.Instead they went by a different band name, “The Artistics”.

At the time, Frantz and Weymouth were dating (they
got married in 1977 and have stayed married ever since), and Weymouth wasn’t a
part of “The Artistics” (though she did act as a groupie of sorts who provided
transportation for the band).However,
the Artistics project never quite got up off the ground, and by 1975, the band
had fizzled out.But this was fine for
Byrne and Frantz, who along with Weymouth moved out to New York City to find
their fame and fortune.The three ended
up living together in a communal loft and Frantz and Byrne set out to begin
another band.

The problem was that despite New York City’s size,
the pair were unable to find a decent bass player for their new band.So Frantz came up with a solution.Since Tina Weymouth was living with them at
the time, why not teach Tina how to play bass in their band?

And the way that Tina learned how to play base was
quite interesting.Ever hear of a
musician by the name of Suzi Quatro?You
might have seen her acting in an episode of two of “Happy Days”, but she is
also considered to be one of the first female bass players to become a huge
solo recording star and she still performs today.I suppose if one was starting out new as a
bass player, Suzi Quatro would be a great person to develop skills from.

With the addition of Weymouth to the band, the
band needed a new name, and the group settled on the name “Talking Heads”.As Weymouth later admitted in an interview,
the group ended up selecting the new name after flipping through the pages of
TV Guide Magazine.A friend had stumbled
upon the term “talking heads” which was used by television studios to describe
a head-and-shoulder shot of a person talking as “all-content, no-action”.For Weymouth and the rest of the band, the
name seemed to describe their group perfectly, and the rest is history.

And for the band’s first gig, you couldn’t do much
better than the New York City music club CBGB.Talking Heads performed their first concert there in 1975, and the rest
is history.

Byrne, Frantz, Weymouth, and keyboard player Jerry
Harrison continued on with the band throughout the rest of the 1970s and 1980s,
releasing eight studio albums between 1977 and 1988, two live albums, and
releasing at least twenty singles between 1977 and 1992.

But in early 1992, David Byrne had made the
decision to pursue a solo career, and that same year, the Talking Heads opted to
call it quits, although Frantz, Weymouth, and Harrison would reunite for one more
album which was released in 1996.

Frantz
and Weymouth would also form their own side project away from the Talking
Heads, the Tom Tom Club, who had a hit single in 1980 with “Genius of Love”.

But their first single will always be the one that
got the Talking Heads noticed...even it it was just a little bit on the morbid
side.

Saturday, October 27, 2012

Last
year, I did a blog entry on the 1988 movie “Beetlejuice”. I make
no secret in telling all of you that it remains one of my all-time
favourite movies. I think I was eight years old when I first saw
this movie, and I fell in love with it almost instantly. I suppose
in some ways, that movie was also my introduction to the wonderful
works of Tim Burton.

And
the movie didn't scare me...much. Okay, the sandworms were a little
bit creepy, but for the most part, I enjoyed the storyline of the
dearly departed Maitlands trying to make sense of their deaths.
Through it all, they ended up befriending a young goth girl named
Lydia Deetz despite the fact that they unleashed the powerful, scary,
and unpredictable Betelgeuse (otherwise known as Beetlejuice).

So
when I heard that there was a cartoon series that was airing on ABC
at the same that that I saw the movie for the first time, I knew that
I had to find a way to see this cartoon just to see how it compared
to the movie.

Only
there wasn't really any comparison at all...mainly because the only
things in common between the movie and the cartoon were characters
and settings.

The
“Beetlejuice” cartoon is unique in the sense that the cartoon at
some point aired on two different networks at the same time. First,
the show debuted on ABC during its Saturday Morning cartoon block
between September 8, 1989 until October 26, 1991. Meanwhile, FOX
decided to pick up the series in September 1991, and aired new
episodes until May 7, 1992, meaning that there was a time in the fall
of 1991 that the show aired on both ABC and FOX.

The
cartoon was also developed by Tim Burton, and featured the voices of
Stephen Ouimette as Beetlejuice, and Alyson Court as Lydia, and for
the most part, the setting remained the same (aside from the name
change from Winter River to Peaceful Pines for the name of the town
Lydia and her family live in).

But
there were far more differences than similarities between the film
and the cartoon series. It was like we were watching a completely
different show.

Not
that I minded very much, as I loved the cartoon just as much as the
movie.

So,
let's take a look at the differences between the film and the movie,
just to showcase what I mean.

Remember
how in the movie, the Maitlands vanquished Beetlejuice back to the
Neitherworld and they remained in the house living side by side with
Lydia? Somehow, the Maitlands must have found a better mansion to
haunt because neither Barbara or Adam make an appearance in the
cartoon at all. I thought that it was a shame to not have them make
at least a cameo appearance, but then again, the whole point of the
cartoon was to focus on the life of Lydia...which then leads to
difference number two.

In
the film, Beetlejuice and Lydia were far from friends. But somehow
in the cartoon version, they are BFF's. Well, okay, so one of the
friends has been dead for hundreds of years, but still, when they get
together, they often have a lot of fun and laughs (even though
Beetlejuice sometimes gets a little too out of control).

And
unlike the film, in which Lydia remains in the human world the entire
time, Lydia can come and go between the real world and the
Neitherworld whenever she pleases. All that Lydia had to do to
summon Beetlejuice (or take a trip to the Neitherworld) was utter the
following chant.

Though
I know I should be wary,

Still
I venture someplace scary,

Ghostly
hauntings I turn loose,

Beetlejuice,
Beetlejuice, BEETLEJUICE!!!

Once
inside the Neitherworld, Beetlejuice and Lydia ended up getting
involved in a lot of adventures together, some of which were scarier
than others. Here are just a few examples of some of the mishaps
that they ended up getting involved in while in the Neitherworld.

Beetlejuice
and Lydia take on a job babysitting Neitherworld babies, which
almost got Beetlejuice sent to be fed to the sandworms!

Neitherworld's
Prince Vince falls in love with Lydia, and asks Beetlejuice for
assistance in getting her to fall in love with him back.

Beetlejuice
finds a new career as an armpit musician, and the success goes to
his head, leaving Lydia and his friends on the outside.

Beetlejuice
takes Lydia and her friends camping in the Neitherworld

Beetlejuice
takes Lydia to a Neitherworld Wild West town where she almost ends
up marrying a bull!

Beetlejuice
uses an abnormal brain when he helps Lydia build a car...the result
is a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde car named “Doomie”.

Beetlejuice
hosts a children's show named “Uncle B.J.'s Roadhouse”.

Lydia
is forced to help Beetlejuice pass kindergarten in the Neitherworld.

Now
what makes these storylines hilarious is the sight gags and visual
puns. For instance, ice cream in the real world is a bunch of
screaming eyes in the Neitherworld. And pumpkin pie becomes
“Punk-in-Pie” in the Neitherworld. There's loads more examples
than this, but I'll save the rest of those for later.

CRUNCH!!!

(Inside joke there
in relation to the show. If you watch enough episodes of the series,
you'll figure it out.)

Oh, and
Beetlejuice often makes appearances in Lydia's world as well.
Despite the fact that nobody in the real world is aware of his
appearance aside from Lydia herself, Beetlejuice often uses his con
man background to bilk the live savings out of everyone in Peaceful
Pines. He masquerades as Betty Juice in order to win the student
body president election at Lydia's school. He causes a lot of
problems when he brings a “Party in a Can” to Lydia's Halloween
party, and as Cousin B.J., he ended up getting Lydia's father to open
up his wallet more times than ever before. Don't worry though, Lydia
would often bring Beetlejuice back down to earth and come up with a
solution to help fix everything.

I guess another
reason why I enjoyed the cartoon so much was because of all of the
new characters that were introduced in the story. The movie spent so
much time focusing on the Maitlands that we never really got to see
much of Beetlejuice or Lydia's personal lives or connections.

In the cartoon, we
are introduced to both characters' circles of friends. In Lydia's
case, her friends are made up of best friends Bertha and Prudence, as
well as her nemesis, the spoiled, stuck-up Clare Brewster.
Beetlejuice isn't really a fan of Lydia's other friends, but he does
tend to leave Bertha and Prudence alone. His real ire is directed
towards Clare, which causes Lydia to get the ultimate revenge on
Clare through Beetlejuice in more ways than one.

Beetlejuice's
friends, on the other hand, aren't really all that chummy with him.
They tolerate him, but are absolutely charmed by Lydia whenever she
pays a visit. These include Jacques, a skeleton who despite having
no muscles or skin still works out in order to maintain his physique,
Ginger, a tap-dancing spider, and the Monster Across The Street, a
big, burly eyeless beast who frequently causes Beetlejuice trouble,
along with his pet, Poopsie.

That's about all
that I have to say about Beetlejuice the cartoon. I think to end
this blog entry off...we'll watch an episode now.